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The Washington Area Film Critics Association winners will be announced at 8 a.m. Check the linked site for a list of winners, or look for a press release on the wire. I'll be at the dentist, wondering which films won.

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The nearly total absence of MYSTERIES OF LISBON from these lists and end-of-year film discussion is starting to get at me. The film was well-received, or so I thought, so that it has almost entirely dropped off the charts is a bit shocking.

Edited December 8, 2011 by Ryan H.

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The nearly total absence of MYSTERIES OF LISBON from these lists and end-of-year film discussion is starting to get at me. The film was well-received, or so I thought, so that it has almost entirely dropped off the charts is a bit shocking.

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TIFF has named its picks for Canada's Top Ten of 2011. I have seen three of these films (Take This Waltz, Hobo with a Shotgun, Starbuck), and there is a fourth that is currently playing in a Vancouver theatre (Cafe de Flore). But I don't believe any of the other six have played here at all, not even at festivals (unless you count the Whistler festival, where at least one of the other films DID play). (There WAS a press screening of A Dangerous Method a week or two ago, which I missed because I had to take my kids to school, but it doesn't open here until January.)

(Runners-up: George Clooney, "The Decendants" and Michael Fassbender, "Shame")

Best Actress

Michelle Williams, "My Week With Marilyn"

(Runner-up: Meryl Streep, "The Iron Lady")

Best Supporting Actor

Albert Brooks, "Drive"

Best Supporting Actress

Melissa McCarthy, "Bridesmaids"

(Runner-up: Jeannie Berlin, "Margaret")

Best Screenplay

"Moneyball"

(Runner-up: "Margaret")

Best Foreign Film

"Incendies"

(Runners-up: "A Separation" and "Poetry")

Best Cinematography

"The Tree of Life"

(Runner-up: “Hugo”)

Best Documentary

"Project Nim"

(Runner-up: “Bill Cunningham, New York)

Best Film Editing (awarded in memory of Karen Schmeer)

“The Clock”

(Runner-up: “Hugo”)

Best New Filmmaker (awarded in memory of David Brudnoy)

Sean Durkin, Martha Marcy May Marlene

(Runner-up: JC Chandor, Margin Call)

Best Ensemble Cast

"Carnage

(Runner-up: "Margaret")

Best Use of Music in a Film

"The Artist" and "Drive"

(Runner-up: "The Descendants")

Best Film Series

All Roads Lead to Nowhere: The Films of Monte Hellman (HFA)

American Punk (HFA)

The Complete Henri-Georges Clouzot (HFA)

Noir Nights (ArtsEmerson)

Science on Screen (Coolidge Corner)

Best Rediscoveries

Children of Hiroshima (Masterworks by Maneto Shindo, HFA)

Days and Nights in the Forest (Sharmila Tagore and Soha Ali Khan: Two Generations in Indian Cinema, HFA)

Deep End (The Radical Visions of Jerzy Skolimowski, HFA)

The Makioka Sisters (New and Restored Prints, MFA)

The Shooting (All Roads Lead to Nowhere The Films of Monte Hellman, HFA)

Special Commendations

To the Brattle Film Foundation for ten years as a nonprofit, for its continued commitment to film preservation, and for its eclectic, and historically and culturally relevant repertory programming at the Brattle Theater.

To Ben Fowlie, Sara Archambault, and Sean Flynn, co-founder programmers of DocYard, for presenting a vibrant forum for the Boston documentary community to see important new non-fiction works and to have meaningful discussions with the filmmakers.

To The Museum of Fine Arts for purchasing, programming, and broadly promoting Christian Marclay's film installation, "The Clock," and for allowing audiences to experience this unique work of cinema in its full 24-hour runtime on select dates.

Last year my Top 10 list mainly consisted of un-heralded indies. This year I give up: I liked “Captain America” and “The Tree of Life,” but I can’t put them on the same list. So my top mainstream movies are here. I’ll post my favorite art-house pictures on The Post’s movies blog.

And then he proceeds to give the #1 spot to ... The Artist. That's a "mainstream" movie? Huh.

I haven't seen the film yet -- the local library's DVD copy is still sitting on a shelf on the other side of the room as I type this -- but, FWIW, when Alejandro Adams tweeted that "Kiarostami's son Ahmad, a 6-year resident of San Francisco, wrote a note to the SFFCC to thank them for honoring Certified Copy yesterday", Mike D'Angelo replied:

Did he add "though the film is 90% in English, & the category specifically says foreign-language, so we're a bit confused"?